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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

Night of Mayhem in Boston Area

Aired April 19, 2013 - 05:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: -- unfolding just outside of Boston this morning. They are going door-to-door looking for a man who fits the description of Boston marathon bombing suspect number two. That is the man seen wearing the white cap in the photos you have been looking at. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What we are looking for right now is a suspect consistent with the description of suspect number two, the white- capped individual who was involved in Monday's bombing of the Boston marathon.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: They have also revealed that suspect number one is dead. You may know him as the man wearing the black hat in the photos. Now, this is an important warning. People in or near Watertown, Massachusetts, eight miles outside of Boston, now are being told to stay inside. Do not answer the door unless the people at the door can clearly identify themselves as law enforcement officials.

This mayhem unfolded overnight starting with a shooting on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. That's one mile from where we are standing right now at the scene of the Boston marathon bomb attack.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: An officer who was killed on the campus of MIT was killed a short time later, a carjacking took place and a police chase took place after that with reports of explosives involved. During the chase, the Transportation Authority officer was wounded in a shoot-out and suspect number one, that's when he was critically wounded and later died at Beth Israel Hospital. We expect a press conference in 15 minutes at the hospital.

BERMAN: We have Drew Griffin with us right now. He's on the streets of Watertown, Massachusetts. Again, this is the area right now which is a very active crime scene where people are being told not to leave their houses where it is believed that suspect number two, the man involved in the Boston marathon bombings and the man involved in this car chase and manhunt tonight, it is believe this is where he's on the loose -- Drew Griffin.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, John and Jake. To that end, I just listened to a robocall that the police on this town have been sending to all its residents, warning them just that. You wonder how people hear the warning in the middle of the night when they're sleeping? Well, the police in this town, in Watertown, have sent out a robocall to the people, telling them not to leave their home, telling them about the police emergency and not to answer the door.

So, there's an active search here for suspect number two as we understand it. And I might point out one other thing that we haven't really talked about, is where these two suspects put their bombs together. They are somewhere presumably in this area, not Watertown, but in the greater Boston area. There's some kind of dwelling, apartment, home or room where these gentlemen put their bombs together that is still very dangerous.

And I'm sure police are trying to figure out exactly where they were living, if they were living in the same place, they were building these bombs, and just how to handle that, because that could also be a very volatile scene they have to deal with yet as they still look for one more suspect.

So this is far, far from over. It's been a chaotic week, a chaotic night. Very dramatic finish here with one of the suspects who is now dead. But one on the loose, and all this danger out there, this could turn into a very long day.

BERMAN: Drew, we believe this investigation has been going on, obviously, since Monday. It has been a hot investigation all week. It is now white hot. As you said, you can imagine that police, law enforcement officials have been told that 9,000 law enforcement officials are in the area now involved in this investigation.

There's the manhunt underway for suspect number two, the man in the white hat at the finish line of the Boston marathon, now believed to be wearing perhaps a gray hoodie. There's the manhunt going on. And there are also people putting together this puzzle, which is probably becoming ever more clear by the second now they have identified these two men.

As you said, looking for a dwelling, trying to go through their vehicles and trying to piece together their movements, not just over the last four or five days here in Boston, but before that. There was an enormous amount of information and they no doubt would like to glean from that.

But let's stick to where you are right now, let's go to Watertown, Massachusetts, which is again is where a lot of this culminated tonight. There was this car chase. There was a shoot-out, one suspect, suspect number one in the Boston marathon bombings now dead. Suspect number two on the loose.

Do you get the sense that people are heeding the warnings they have been given to stay inside, to not come out on the streets right now because it is a very dangerous situation?

GRIFFIN: I am just looking around and see very few people who are not of the press or of law enforcement. We did see a few citizens come out earlier in the evening. They have all gone away. There's absolutely no street traffic in any of the directions except the flashing lights you see behind me and from the law enforcement vehicles coming in and out.

So this town has pretty much buttoned up. I don't see any door-to- door searches from my vantage point. That maybe just be because this area has been cleared or they believe the suspect ran in a different direction.

Behind me is where the shoot-out and activity took place. A few blocks down and around that corner. We were up there shortly after it happened, literally 100 or so police vehicles and hundreds of police officers swarming the area, looking here or there with their guns drawn. But once that scene settled we were pushed back to this location.

It is a quiet scene, and I have to say at this hour of the morning, it is eerily quiet because this town should be starting to wake up and right now, it's just not.

BERMAN: Drew Griffin right now for us in Watertown, Massachusetts. I ask everyone out there to forgive me for looking down occasionally at my various electronic devices right now. There's so much information new that is coming in. This situation so fluid and really we have to keep abreast of the latest situation right now.

But let me tell you this, that this terrorist bombing that happened on Monday here in Boston, that took the lives of three people watching the Boston marathon and injured more than 170 people injured, has new victims tonight. There was a campus police officer at MIT University across the Charles River here who was killed by the suspects. There was a car chase and an MBTA officer was shot and wounded in this police chase.

So, two more casualties, one dead and one wounded in this incredibly dramatic week of crime and terrorism in the Massachusetts area.

Again, just to bring people up to speed on what we know, because it has been changing by the hour right now. At 10:20 last night in the city of Cambridge, Massachusetts, on the campus of MIT, there was a police officer killed in his car multiple gunshot wounds. There was a carjacking with the man who owned the car kept in the car for a short period of time.

A police chase ensued and at some point the man who owned the car was released, as Jake Tapper pointed out, a very lucky man.

TAPPER: Very lucky, yes.

BERMAN: Some time during the police chase, there was a shoot-out and suspect number one, the man seen in the black hat at the finish line of the Boston marathon, suspect number one was wounded and taken to the hospital. He has seen died.

Suspect number two is still on the loose. Suspect number two was the man seen in the white hat at the finish line at the Boston marathon bombings. Authorities have released a new photo of him overnight, among the many brand new photos we've seen overnight.

TAPPER: That's him at a 7-Eleven last night wearing a gray hoodie. He's thought to be armed and extremely dangerous.

He's in the area of Watertown, Massachusetts, about eight miles, you say, John, outside of Boston. And the individuals there, who people who live there, are told not to leave their homes. Do not answer the door unless it is an identified police officer.

So, if you do get a knock on your door, it could be an actual police officer. Do not answer it unless it is a police officer. We're told that upwards of 9,000 to 10,000 police officers in Watertown right now looking for this individual, suspect number two, with the white hat.

There's also a robocall going out to residents of Watertown warning them of this threat in their midst. One other thing about this threat, and this is coming from overnight when we were following this story all night. There was an individual who it turns out presumably is completely innocent, but police detained him and made him take off all of his clothing.

And when they made him take off all his clothing, it was clearly because they worried about an explosive on him.

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN ANALYST: And, Jake, here's what should be happening just to remind people, it's a vacation week in Massachusetts. So a lot of people from here, a lot of people left town on Friday and have missed all of this. There's a lot of empty homes and apartments in Watertown, Cambridge, all these places.

So what they want to do is sort of make sure that these homes that are vacated, that the suspect is not in there, but they want to make sure the suspect is not holding people within their own homes.

We will probably start to see some controlled evacuations just to get people out of there, who wants to be in Watertown right now if this is going to be ongoing throughout the course of the day. So you'll probably start to see some evacuations, getting people to safe areas, getting them to their family and friends, and to let the police do what they need to do in Watertown.

BERMAN: You're talking about controlled evacuations. We are just learning that the MBTA, which is the transportation authority here, is sending buses to the Watertown area to help remove the people who live there, evacuate some people, just get them out, get them to safety so they can do this manhunt and go door-to-door in the meticulous way they want.

KAYYEM: We do not want friendly fire if there will be fire going on. This is a residential neighborhood. So this is what law enforcement does -- you get the citizens out and you now secure the area and hopefully as I have been saying when daylight comes, they'll be able to, he'll be more exposed than he has been.

BERMAN: One of the ways they have been warning people in the Watertown area is with phone calls, robocalls made to most of the residents there. Let's listen to what it sounds like.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

ROBOCALL: Watertown Police Department -- there's an active incident in Watertown right now. Chief Deveau is advising all residents to remain in their homes. If you hear or see anything suspicious, call the Watertown Police Department at 617-926500.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

BERMAN: Stay in your homes, do not answer the door unless the person clearly is identified as a law enforcement official.

KAYYEM: You have to remember, most people in Watertown have probably slept through this. So, they're waking up getting ready for work or going out for a run. So you are seeing this, what's called reverse 911, which is the phone calls going out to every single home, every phone number they have in Watertown. Just telling people -- the moment -- they are essentially waking them up, which is the right thing to do.

BERMAN: Perhaps you slept through this. In the Boston area, we had a huge amount of supers that woke me up from bed in Boston. I'm getting e-mails from several people in this area who would never normally be up at the 3:00, 4:00, 5:00 hour waking up to this, because everyone wants to know what's going to happen here.

TAPPER: And these events unfolded, it started at 10:20 on the campus of MIT, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. There was one officer shot. One police officer was killed. There was a carjacking.

It led to Watertown where one of these individuals, one of the suspects wanted in the terrorist attacks in the Boston massacre, one of them is on the loose. One of them was critically wounded, taken to Beth Israel Hospital. We expect a press conference any minute there. We already know he's dead. He has been killed.

The individual on the loose, suspect number two with the white hat, there is a picture of him taken this evening. Let's get that on the screen. It's him wearing a gray hoodie taken at a 7-Eleven earlier. There was a press conference an hour ago when law enforcement warned of this individual and talked about the steps they were taking to get him. There were 9,000 or 10,000 police officers swarming throughout the area of Watertown, Massachusetts.

John, you're from this area, what --

BERMAN: Watertown is an area eight miles outside of Boston. It's outside of Cambridge. You know, it's -- I won't say it's a better community. It is closer than that to Boston. A lot of people live there who work in the city, a perfectly nice town.

On the phone with us right now, we have brad, a producer for "PIERS MORGAN" right now, who I believe is in Boston, witnessing a great deal of police activity at this moment. What are you seeing?

Sorry, we lost him for a second. We lost him for second. But we'll go back to Watertown.

Jake, I have to give you a sense of the scope of this investigation right now. We are in Boston. We're standing right near the finish line of the Boston marathon right now, about a mile and a half away from MIT.

The news conference right now is about to start, I believe this is at the hospital where one of the suspects was taken. OK. Correction, this is an FBI news conference, where I imagine we'll get a great deal of information on this investigation on this nights that has unfolded. Boy, has a lot been going on.

TAPPER: It's been an eventful evening. One of the things challenging about this for people watching at home and for those of us following it in the media is that we did not know for certain until roughly an hour ago that these events were definitively connected. There was a strong suspicion with police officers operating under the presumption that the officer killed at MIT was killed by one of the suspects or both of the suspects in the terrorist attack on Monday. That the carjacking was related, that the incident going on in Watertown, the shoot-out going on in Watertown was connected, but we were not certain.

Even though there were police and FBI swarming in both areas, even though the command center, the mobile command center that was here when we began broadcasting here, from here at 12:30 this morning, even though it left and went to parts unknown, we did not know for certain until the FBI definitively. And law enforcement and the commonwealth attorney put out statements definitively stating that these two suspects have been involved in everything.

One of the suspects is now dead and one of them is now wanted and presumed extremely dangerous in Watertown, Massachusetts.

BERMAN: They made it crystal clear, Ed Davis, the Boston city police chief, said this man is a terrorist and he's a terrorist who is on the loose right now. And you have to be very, very careful if you live in the Watertown area. Do not answer your door unless you know it is a law enforcement official outside there.

That's the picture of the suspect right now that was taken earlier this evening or last night in a gray hoodie. We believe it was taken at a 7-Eleven store.

KAYYEM: By the time this night is over, we probably have a couple dozen law enforcement agencies been on this search alone. When you think of the MBTA, the state police, Boston, Cambridge, Watertown and the others, it's a unified effort. You can definitely tell that right now and it really does show you how sort of local police are really sort of dealing with crime, they deal with searching for terrorists. It's a huge burden on them.

And I hear that there's a couple thousand cops on this one hunt right now. So, you know, we'll see what unfolds in the next few hours.

BERMAN: It turns out there's not an FBI conference coming in the next few minutes, but we are expecting a news conference from the hospital where the suspect, suspect number one, the man in the black hat, was taken after he was wounded in this police chase. He died at that hospital.

Again, one of the suspects in the Boston marathon bombings now dead.

TAPPER: Killed in a shoot-out with police officers because there was an incident on the campus of Cambridge -- in Cambridge, on the campus of MIT, the Massachusetts institute of technology, and there was a car chase with police officers chasing the two suspects. One of them now dead. One of them on the loose and presumed extremely dangerous.

BERMAN: Let's try to get Brad Parks on the telephone. Brad Parks on the telephone who's in Watertown, Massachusetts, he's on the scene right now there, witnessing what's going on.

Brad, what can you tell us?

BRAD PARKS CNN CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): I'm at the corner of Arsenal Street and School Street. The FBI and local command unit, a truck is parked here, probably in the last 15 minutes they pulled up, we have seen 20 law enforcement vehicles ranging from black SUVs to unmarked cars come through the road block that is blocking School Street off.

We have also seen about three transit buses being driven by law enforcement officials. We were told at one point they may be used to evacuate residents and we did hear from officials they could be used as a shield.

We are seeing about six canine units also walking around right now. There's a heavy presence, they appear to be staging this on the intersection of School Street and Dexter Avenue. We see about three local transit buses, but everyone seems to be just kind of holding in place right now.

BERMAN: All right, Brad. Brad Parks for us on the ground.

KAYYEM: And people of Boston, in particular, there's just going to be a lot of these packages, suspicious bags, I think over the next couple of days, because law enforcement is going to be very, very nervous about what might be out there and whether there are copy cats. I think we're going to see a lot of this activity.

BERMAN: All right. I'm John Berman. Jay Tapper. Juliette Kayyem here, homeland security analyst, also columnist with "The Boston Globe" here.

We are here in Boston covering these dramatic developments that have been going on really all night here since 10:00 last night. Let's bring you up to speed, give you a full recap of how this all went down. Ten o'clock last night, at about 10:20 p.m., there was a shooting, a campus police officer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology shot and killed in his car multiple gunshot wounds. Then, there was a carjacking. Two suspects hijacking a car, keeping the men in the car with them for a short while and then there was a police chase.

TAPPER: We should also note, the man was let free, amazingly, and is apparently unharmed.

BERMAN: During this police chase authorities say that perhaps the suspects were throwing explosives out the window at law enforcement officials. Showing you just how dangerous this situation is. Then a shoot-out, suspect number one was shot and wounded. He was taken to a local area hospital where he since died.

And then at this point authorities are saying suspect number two, the man who has been seen as the man in the white hat at the Boston marathon finish line, suspect number two is currently on the loose and there's a manhunt underway.

TAPPER: And this is something we need to reiterate. We apologize for those hearing this for the tenth time, twelfth time, the 15th time, but if you live in or around Watertown, Massachusetts, which is a neighborhood roughly eight miles outside Boston, if you live in that area, do not leave your homes and do not answer your door unless it is a clearly identified police officer.

You should expect, because roughly 9,000 to 10,000 police officers are in Watertown, going door-to-door. You should expect a police officer to knock on your door, and if he's clearly identified, answer the door.

There are also -- we call them robocalls. Juliette and others national security experts will call them reverse 911s, but there are reverse calls going out to the houses of all residents of Watertown, Massachusetts, warning them about what's going on. Warning them there is, in the words of law enforcement, a terrorist on the loose in Watertown.

BERMAN: And the MBTA, the transportation authority here, sending buses to the Watertown area to help get innocent people out to evacuate them to make the crime scene easier to deal with right now.

Deb Feyerick, CNN's Deborah Feyerick, is on the ground right now in Watertown to gie us a sense of what's going on there.

Deb, what are you seeing?

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Yes, John and Jake, we're seeing, we're trying -- we're trying to our producer -- just to let you know what's here.

Police have cordoned off a major area of Arsenal, in the Watertown area. And we are seeing police officers are heavily armed and their tanks, shotguns, with assault rifles in full protective gear with helmets and vests. There are staging areas where a number of officers are getting direction. We are told that a state trooper -- state trooper is checking cars.

(CROSSTALK)

TAPPER: I'm sorry, we have to interrupt. Deb, we are going to interrupt you right now. I apologize. There's a press conference going on right now at Beth Israel Hospital where this first suspect was brought after he was wounded and died.

We're going to go live to Beth Israel right now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We still do have 12 victims from the initial event hospitalized here at the hospital. One of them still in serious condition in the ICU. We initially received 24 patients here from the original event on Monday. The vast majority of those patients have been discharged.

We are open and ready for any patients to come to the medical center this morning, although we are restricting access to ensure safety for patients, family and visitors and asking people to show patience as they come in this morning.

REPORTER: Was that patient brought in under police guard tonight?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That patient was brought in with police guard, yes.

REPORTER: Can you describe the injuries of the patient?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I cannot -- we do want to make available the physician that initially heard the events in Watertown.

DR. SCHOENFELD: So, my name is Dr. Schoenfeld. Last night as I was doing some work at home and watching the news coverage of the officer- involved shooting over at MIT, I was sitting at home and was able to hear the sounds of gunshots and explosions because I live in Watertown. And when I started hearing the gunshots and explosions, I recognized that something was really wrong and called the emergency department to let them know and then quickly got dressed to come into work and rushed over to the emergency department.

REPORTER: How quickly did you get here?

SCHOENFELD: I arrived in the emergency department before the patient arrived.

REPORTER: What time did you hear the gunshots?

SCHOENFELD: Sometime after 12:45.

REPORTER: Doctor, can you give us the name of the deceased?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.

We don't have any information on the identity of the deceased patient.

REPORTER: Do you know the age?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't have that information.

REPORTER: Can you give us a gender?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's an adult male.

REPORTER: Doctor, can you describe your feelings of being in Watertown, hearing the noise and alerting the E.R., you come into work and then you end up seeing that same patient? (INAUDIBLE) irony.

SCHOENFELD: So there's a couple different parts to it. One is when I started to hear the gunshots and the explosions, given what had happened over at MIT and seeing all the police cars rushing into Watertown past my house and hearing all the sirens, I knew or felt very strongly that this was related to the events from earlier this week as well as from what happened over at MIT earlier in the evening.

And so, because of that I felt as though something large enough was going on in the community that it warranted calling the emergency department and coming in. The emotions, you know, you sort of set aside when you come in to go to work and to do the job.

REPORTER: Did you actually work on the patient who was shot and is deceased?

SCHOENFELD: So I really don't want to talk about that.

REPORTER: OK. I was going to say, knowing what you knew going into it, as a doctor, how do you deal with that?

SCHOENFELD: So you give the best care you can to every patient that comes to you regardless of may or may not be, because you don't know what happened out there and you don't know who they are. You don't know what the circumstances are.

So whether it was a suspect, an innocent police officer, you have no idea who it is when they arrive and you give them the best care that you can to try to help them.

REPORTER: Being (INAUDIBLE), did you look out the window at all or see anything outside?

SCHOENFELD: So I did go and look out the window. I did not see anything other than the police cars rushing into Watertown.

REPORTER: Being an urban medical center, you bring in police guard all the time, was there anything different in the emergency room? More police officers or anything unusual because this is very serious what's happening here.

SCHOENFELD: So there was a large police presence when the patient arrived. More so than typical, but --

REPORTER: Were they able to talk to the patient at all or glean anything from him?

SCHOENFELD: I don't know what the police -- I can't speak to that.

REPORTER: The police did say there was a suspect confirmed. Can you confirm that the suspect was here?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We can't confirm it at all. All we can say is a patient was brought in. We don't have any more information than that. In fact, you probably do have more information than we do about that.

REPORTER: Cause of death, sir?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This was a trauma arrest. Multiple injuries, probably, we believe a combination of blasts, potentially gunshots.

REPORTER: How many gunshots?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Unable to count. Yes.

REPORTER: I'm sorry (INAUDIBLE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And probably a blast injury.

REPORTER: Blast injury?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: An explosive device, possibly shrapnel, thermal injury.

REPORTER: Can you describe where?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was pretty much throughout the trunk. It was multiple wounds.

REPORTER: Would it be consistent with a bomb strapped (INAUDIBLE)?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Unclear. I think the medical examiner will be able to comment conclusively say that, but there were signs of more than just gunshot wounds.

(INAUDIBLE)

REPORTER: Multiple gunshots.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are going to take two or three questions, but that's about all that we can say.

REPORTER: Did he lose a lot of blood?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't believe so.

REPORTER: Do we know if he said anything?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All we know is he arrived in arrest here. We don't know what happened at the scene.

REPORTER: So he was in cardiac arrest and died in the emergency room? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's correct.

(INAUDIBLE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's correct.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, thank you very much. Thank you.

TV ANCHOR: And that is the latest, a live update from the doctors and the administrators from Beth Israel hospital --

BERMAN: You have been watching the press conference where suspect number one, one of the suspects in the Boston marathon bombings, one of the suspects involved in the car chase and a series of shoot-outs with police last night where he was taken after he was wounded and subsequently died.

TAPPER: He was killed. The doctors and physicians were asked many questions about how he was killed. They said he was brought in with extreme trauma to his body, there was gunshot wounds and evidence of a blast, an explosive blast -- burns and shrapnel.

We know the two suspects in the Boston terrorist attack, that they on the lam this evening were, pursued by law enforcement. They have been described by law enforcement as having explosives with them as we stated, as John pointed out.

Suspect number one, the one in the black hat, has been killed. That's who the physicians were speaking about. He was killed in the shoot- out and there's evidence apparently he was also hurt by one of the explosives.

BERMAN: Suspect number two, the man you're seeing there in the white hat right now, we have a more current picture of him taken overnight in a gray hoodie. Suspect number two is on the loose. There is a manhunt underway going on right now believed right now centered in the Watertown area eight miles outside of Boston.

This is a very fluid situation. We are getting details coming in by the minute here. We will bring you the latest just ahead.

Stay with CNN. Our coverage continues in just a moment.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BERMAN: If you are just joining us, we want to bring you up-to-date on an extraordinary night, an extraordinary morning we have been having as the story unfolds in the Boston area.

Police going door to door right now in the town of Watertown. That's about eight miles outside of Boston. They are looking for a man who fits the description of the Boston marathon bomber, suspect number two. He's the man seen in the picture last night wearing the white hat. Those pictures were taken the day of the Boston marathon.

Now, people in or near Watertown are being told to stay inside their homes. Do not answer the door under any circumstances, unless the people there can identify themselves as law enforcement officials. People in Watertown are also getting robocalls like this one.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

ROBOCALL: Hello. This Detective Connor (ph) with the Watertown police department. There's an active incident in Watertown right now. Chief Deveau is advising all Watertown residents to remain in their homes. If you hear or see anything suspicious, call the Watertown Police Department at 617-926500.

(END AUDIO CLIP)